Tenseiga's Heir
by Dantea Dredkin
Summary: One night no one could remember. That was all it took for my conception. My Uncle once told me I am my Father's greatest mistake, but now, twenty years later, the miko is dying. My Mother is dying. He is the only one with the power to save her, as much as I hate him. It time I went down the well again. It is time I meet my Father, this...Lord Sesshoumeru. ON HAITUS
1. Unmemorable Night

**Entreri; Ent-(like the beging of enter)rer-(like rare) i- (ie or y, the 'ee' sound).**

**Ent-rare-ee**

**Entreri.**

**Enjoy.**

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Sunlight filtered through her eyelids, warm and inviting. Kagome smiled in her dazed, half asleep state and stretched down to the tip of her toes. She couldn't remember the last time she had slept this well. Arms tightened around her waist, warm and comforting, and Kagome breathed in deeply, taking in the smell of clean dog and hair wet with dew. InuYasha. She smiled again.

Soft breath tickled the back of her neck. Kagome's smile faded. She couldn't quite remember falling asleep with InuYasha. In fact, she distinctly remembered falling asleep in her own bed, _alone_, in her own time, and why was she _naked?_

Her eyes flashed open, and the first thing she saw was her own black hair spilling across the sheet of sliver, feather light strands of her companion's hair. Sunlight made dappled patterns through the trees on their intertwined forms, and Kagome herd birdsong not far off.

She lifted her head up and saw the meadow, the flowers, the sunlight. An almost perfect setting. Kagome turned her head, and saw him, his head resting lightly on her shoulder. His long curten of hair carpeted the ground under them and over them, and his arms twined around her waist. His aristocratic features were relaxed in sleep, long dark eyelashes curling over magenta eyelids, dark red slashes softly highlighting his high cheekbones. The crescent moon on his forehead. The muscled, wiry frame.

Sesshoumeru.

Kagome froze up and squeaked, and the Taiyoukai's eyelids fluttered like the most delicate of butterfly wings, and then opened to reveal the old gold of his eyes. He looked at her sleepily, breathed in, exhaled, and...smiled?

It was a moment long expression, a slight bowing of the lips, a crinkle in the eyes, an expression without distance or ice. Kagome must have made some sound of fear, because those golden eyes blinked at her, seemed to actually focus on her, and then his face was schooled back into submission. He had no expression, of course, but if Kagome had to guess, she would have said he looked at her like he couldn't quite remember what she was doing there.

Her heart beat fast and hard, and every breath seemed a lifetime as he looked at her. And then, without a word, his arms slipped away from her waist and he sat up, focusing his attention around them. Every movement was deliberate and graceful. Kagome began to edge away from him, trying not to draw attention to herself.

He didn't look at her as he stood, didn't glance her. Kagome had a hard time keeping the daemon in her sights without looking _down,_ but she managed it with much blushing and static in her ears. Sesshoumeru bent down and picked something up, his clothes, she saw. He began to put them on without hurry, without embarrassment for his nakedness. He still didn't acknowledge her presence.

It really began to hit her then. Oh god. _Oh god._ Did they...? She shuddered. Why couldn't she _remember_ anything? A helpless, frustrated feeling welled up inside her. Her eyes burned.

"Sesshoumeru-" She couldn't finish. Her whisper died in her throat. The Taiyoukai continued to ignore her as he dressed.

She took a ragged breath. "Sesshoumeru." She said a bit louder, holding back the burn in her throat. "Sesshoumeru. What did you do?"

He paused briefly before tying his obi, the last piece of his dress. "This Sesshoumeru does not remember." He said evenly.

Kagome drew her knees to her chest and held her stomach. She put her chin on her knees and let the shudders flow freely, trying not to make a sound. Sesshoumeru began to walk away, to the tree line. Kagome buried her face in her knees and wept with sorrow. She knew...she knew. She felt the ache in her, the soreness. She'd never felt it before, but it was unmistakeable. She'd been tainted. By a _demon._ Suddenly, all she wanted was to be with her mama. She wanted her own bed and her own life and she wanted this to never have happened.

She curled in on herself and cried in her misery. She felt a shadow fall over her, and she tensioned, forced herself to be quiet, tried to hold it all in. She wished he would leave all ready. She wanted her shame to go unnoticed. Something dropped to her feet. She glanced up and saw her clothes in a heap in front of her.

Kagome looked at the demon, at a point in the middle of his chest. She couldn't bring herself to look at his face. He knelt down to her level and she looked at the ground, focused on anything but _him._ She felt an internal struggle from him.

Finally, he spoke. "You were..._untouched_, before now?" Kagome's face flushed with heat and she fidgeted. She glared at the ground. And then she felt a clawed hand rest on her head, softly, like she would break. She froze, and her eyes squeezed closed. She shuddered.

"I'm sorry."

And then he was gone.

...

InuYasha was pulled from deep within his mind. The last thing he remembered was...was...Sango. And Miroku. They were in Kaede's village, waiting for Kagome to come back through the well. And then...darkness.

In front of him was a little girl, what was her name? Oh yes, Rin. She was bleeding, unconscious. Five long, deep claw marks marred her skin, from her right shoulder to the middle of her chest. InuYasha stepped forward, worried, reached out to help her, saw his hands, his claws, dripping with blood.

Rin's blood.

Everywhere. He was covered in it. What had happened? Where was he? Why couldn't he _remember?_ This was all wrong. Nothing was right. It couldn't be. It didn't make sense. It couldn't be.

But it was.

His breath shuddered. He heard her faint heartbeat. Distantly, as if it was someone else, he watched himself stepped foreword. He would make this right. Whatever had happened, he would make it right. InuYasha didn't catch his sent until it was too late, until the blade of Bakusaiga bit into his throat.

Blood ran down the length of the blade, dripped off, fell to the grass.

"Leave." Was Sesshoumeru's only command. InuYasha backed off, hands up in surrender, wary of his half-brother's wrath. Sesshoumeru turned from him, not acknowledging his presence any further, and bent down to assist Rin.

The wind changed.

A sent blew to him.

Kagome.

_Kagome._

Bakusaiga bit into the flesh of his chest as he jumped at the Taiyoukai, and blood sprayed out. InuYasha was thrown back, and he landed on his feet, furry dark on his face.

"What did you do?" He demanded of his expressionless brother. "What did you do?" He screamed as he launched himself at the daemon again, claws extended. Sesshoumeru had the dying girl in one arm, cradling her, but his other arm flashed out again and another cut was made across the Hanyou's stomach, calling forth another arch of blood. InuYasha's growl split the air, and he reached for Tetsusaiga, only to find it missing from his sheath.

"Where is she!" He demanded. "Kagome! I can smell what you did to her!" The daemon watched him, but didn't grace him with an answer. "Ahhhhh!" He screamed as he he jumped up and came down, claws extended.

Bakusaiga fell to the ground.

Taiyoukai claws flashed out.

Blood drenched the Daemon Lord.

Hanyou blood.

InuYasha stood frozen, bloody claws an inch away from Sesshoumeru's impassive face, wearing a look of shock. Sesshoumeru's arm extended into the Hanyou's stomach, deep in flesh, claws making an absolute mess of the Hanyou's spine. Sesshoumeru just sort of _twisted,_ and there was a resorting _crack!_ And InuYasha was forced onto his toes and his face was a mask of anger and agony.

Sesshoumeru brought his little brother closer, whispered, "Leave."

Position exploded out of the wound, and InuYasha arched and screamed, and then he was writhing on the ground and the Taiyoukai was gone with his ward.

InuYasha tried to pull himself to his feet, tried to get up, but his legs wouldn't work right. He couldn't feel his legs. _He couldn't feel his legs._

...

Seconds. Minuets. Hours. Sometime later, she found herself in their hut. Empty. InuYasha, Sango, Miroku, all gone. She was dressed again. When did that happen? She couldn't remember. The fire cat and Kit were missing as well. Looking for her? She hoped not. She hoped they were without worry, doing something fun, waiting for her to come back, to come home.

_This isn't home anymore._

When had she stopped thinking of her time as home? When did she start to think of her friends here as more family than the one she was born with? Not any more. When she thought about everything here now, it felt like a dream. A horrible dream. She wanted to go home, run from it, forget this ever happened. What would they say? Would Shippo be old enough to even understand what had happened? Would InuYasha be able to tell instantly? Could he smell it on her?

She shuddered, left the cold, empty hearth and hut, and looked down the street. At first, she thought it was a dream. Her friend, covered in blood, the most particular expression on her face. Hiraikotsu was slung over her shoulder. Sango walked up to Kagome, and they looked at each other. Their expressions were eerily smiler.

"Where are the others?" Kagome asked.

"Miroku is dead." Sango answered.

"Oh."

"I killed him."

"Oh."

"Kohaku is dead, too."

"Did you kill him, too?"

"No. Miroku did."

"Oh."

"..."

"You hungry?"

"...Ya. Sure."

...

Shippo didn't come back, but Kirara did. The cat seemed dejected. Kagome eventully dragged herself out of the hut and looked for the Kit and the Hanyou, with no sucess. InuYasha managed to drag himself back eventually, but even his sharp knose couldn't find poor little Shippo, and the fact that he was paralised from the waist down didn't help any. Kagome took him to a hospitable in her own time, because his injury's were too great for her to treat herself. He didn't mention the sent of lust on her, and she didn't bring it up.

Soon, with his Hanyou healing ability and intense physical therapy, he managed to to walk with a cane, a limp, and ungodly amounts of medication, to the astonishment of every doctor they encountered. They explained his unusual demonic attributes as a strange genetic mutation that runs in his family, (which wasn't exactly a lie) and all though nobody believed that for a minuet, most modern day physitions will not immediately jump to the conclusion that a half-daemon just walked into their clinic. (plus, nobody wanted to get sued, which they were threatened with a lot.)

InuYasha went back to the futal era, only ever coming back to the present for more medication, and Kagome stayed in her time. She didn't go to any funeral's, Miroku's or Kohaku's, or even missing Shippo's, who was never found. But she mourned. God knows she mourned.

She just wanted to forget.

But fate wouldn't let her.

A few weeks after _the incident,_ she took a test. Just a little test. A small little test with only one question. A simple yes or no answer.

The answer was yes.

The child's name was Entreri.

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**Read and Review.**


	2. Down the Rabbit Hole

**Ok, sense I've gotten so much more Shippo love than I expected, I decided to update early to tell you this.**

**Shippo appears later.  
**

**There. Not much, but there you go. I plan to update every Friday until I run out of chapters, because I only have, like...half of this pre-written and I need to finish it, and _god_ I'm halfway through and Sesshoumeru hasn't even appeared yet. I've spent the whole time expanding on Entreri's character.  
**

**Enjoy.**

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He had no claws.

He had no claws or fangs, scales or fur, markings or scares. No extra appendages, or missing appendages. He did not transform. He did not grow too quickly or too slowly. He did not hiss or growl or bark, and he did not eat human flesh or something equally detestable.

Truly, he was the perfect wolf amongst the sheep.

Pale, perfect artist's fingers lathered a scentless shampoo into his hair, his knee length black hair, in a modern, expensive looking shower. Muscles tightly trained into submission coiled and moved under the skin of his back and arms, flexing, relaxing. Deadly and smooth. When he stepped out of the shower he was wreathed in steam.

Towel wrapped securely around his waist, he stepped out into a large, roomy apartment. The penthouse. _His _penthouse. Golden hues of sunrise shone brilliantly through a glass wall, highlighting the colorless pastels and pale whites used in the room. It was all very neat. Very organized.

Very cold.

Three servants waited for him, and without a word, they set to work on their routine. One woman pulled back his hair as he sat down, and got to work straightening and drying and brushing the long, ebony locks into ruler straight submission. Another grabbed a bowel of rosewater and got to work on his immaculate fingernails, while the third cared for his delicately extended foot. He relaxed into their care with the ease of a man who had been treated so a hundred times before, and expected to be a hundred times again.

His carefully blank facade was allowed to slip into a predatory expression of contentment for a few moments before his assistants finished and he rose to stalk with smooth grace to his dressing room. His movements were swift and sure as the silks and fine materials of his clothes were graced with the honor or adorning him that day. Those clever pianist fingers buttoned his shirt up smoothly, leaving the top two undone to tease the imagination with a peak at a finely sculptured chest.

He selected a matching black overcoat and tied the thing together with a two thousand dollar Rolex watch. He was pleased when he exited to find the servants had all ready scampered off to see to his Lady Mother. He heard pleasant conversation and smelled fresh coffee from two stories below. He paused and cracked a rare smile as her laughter echoed up to his slightly pointed ears, the only physical evidence that hinted at inhuman ansestory.

In a blur too fast to see, he was down two flights of stairs and in his Lady Mother's morning room, where a table had been set up with a delicate, porcelain tea set steaming with his Mother's morning drink. He smelled milk and cream and sugar to lessen the bitterness, along with some of Mother's customary lilac perfume. He appeared just as her beautiful laughter began to fade to a smile. Two of the servants stood at her side, one holding the morning newspaper, the other a pitcher of coffee. Their accompanying smiles died at his sudden appearance, but they didn't flinch. They were used to their Lord's inhuman accomplishments, if not entirely comfortable with them.

Entreri put two hands on his Mother's shoulders and placed a delicate kiss on her pale cheek before seating himself beside her and motioning for the maid to pour him a cup. Her smile brightened as pale, faded eyes tracked him, giving the impression of not quite looking at what they were seeing.

"Good morning, dear. Finally decided to accept my invitation sip some coffee with me?" She asked with a good humored smile, sipping at her drink.

"I take coffee with you every morning, remember Mother?" His smile was slightly strained. "How are you today? You seem better. Have you been taking the medication that doctor prescribed?" He not-so-studly changed the topic.

She sighed. "Of course not. Fowl stuff, that is." She took a sip of her drink.

Entreri sighed and put his china cup down. "Mother...you should really-"

"Please, Entreri. No more. They make me too tired to enjoy the day." Her faded blue eyes didn't meet his intense, yellow orbs. She placed her drink on the table. "I want my...time left to be happy."

His eyes were pained. "Mother, the medicine will give you more time. That is all I need. Just a little more time and you will be well again."

Her eyes were sad when she looked at him. "Everyone dies, son." She looked away again, out the window. The china cup was back in her hand, and she sipped without seeming to taste it. "Besides, I had a good life. There's not much more I can ask for."

A sudden shudder ran down her back. Slowly, so slowly, she placed the china cup down on the table cloth and went still. Her eyes stared fixedly at nothing, and she somehow gave the impression of being relaxed and tensioned at the same time.

His face was suddenly a mask. "Not you." He whispered. "You deserve better than _this._"

Her eyes stayed firmly fixed on something no one else could see, and then she shook her head and finally focused on him. She smiled. "Good morning, dear. Finally decided to accept my invitation to sip some coffee with me?"

His voice was neutral and his eyes in shadow. "Not today, Mother. I have to go to work." He stood up. "Be sure to take your medication." He turned and left, too fast to see that same good humored smile, but that accursed hearing still caught her words on the elevator ride down.

"No way. Fowl stuff, that is."

A towering, heavily muscled man in a black suit sporting a cleanly shaven, military style cut was waiting for him when he stepped off the elevator, falling into step behind him as he walked to the lobby doors.

"You found it, then?" Entreri asked. The bellhop jumped to open the door for the two men, bowing deeply.

"It was not an easy thing, but it was done." The man handed Entreri a leather briefcase and touched a hand to a wire earpiece briefly. "_Si. Si, pilotar el coche_."

He turned to Entreri. "The driver is coming around."

Entreri inclined his head briefly. "Thank you, Hendricks."

A sleek, black limo pulled to the curb in front of them and sat idling as they climbed in, Entreri first and the man, Hendricks, last. He stood with the attentiveness of a bodyguard and the look of a wolf with the sent. After they were seated, Entreri pressed a button and the screen separating them from the driver rolled down. "My Grandmother's house, if you please."

"Yes, Lord." The driver pulled away from the curb and into the traffic of early morning Tokyo. Entreri didn't glance out the tinted, bullet proof glass, but instead pulled the briefcase onto his lap and opened the latches with simultaneous clicks. The broken shards of a mirror glinted out at him from velvet beds, but did not reflect anything around them. The surface rolled with mist.

"So it was destroyed." Entreri's face was impassive, but his voice held the barest traces of disappointment.

"The Lady Kagome said it had been shattered."

"I know. But it is damaged worse than I thought it would be." He touched one finger tip to the surface of a shard, and ripples spread from point of contact through the greyness of the mirror. "I shall be greatly disappointed if we acquired this for nothing."

"I tested it." Hendricks replied. "The shards still work independently."

Cold, golden eyes flickered to the bodyguard's face. A single eyebrow was raised. "That is no small thing, for a human." The man took the complement with a noncommunicable grunt. Those sharp, golden eyes didn't waiver. "And considering you had no guarantee they would work... it could have been dangerous, too. Almost...foolish." Not responding, Hendricks pulled an expensive pair of sunglasses out of a pocket and flipped them on without a care.

Those eyes went back to the shards as he examined them. "Make sure it does not happen again. Foolishness is not tolerated in this organization."

The body guard's expression was stern, but behind the glasses his eyes glinted with amusement. His boss had a particular way of showing he cared.

An hour or so later, they were rolling through country, and then the suburbs. Twenty minuets after that, they pulled out in front of a nondescript house in a nondescript neighborhood. Hendricks got out first and opened the car door for Entreri, who ghosted out and waited for Hendricks as he stuck his head into the window. "Leave." He said. The driver complied with only too much joy.

Entreri started off without looking back, and Hendricks once again fell into step behind him. He knocked on the front door, and after a moment was greeted by a smiling older man in his late twenty's or early thirty's. Entreri formally placed a hand over his heart and bowed. "Greetings, most esteemed Uncle." Hendricks remained silent, a dark form in the background.

The man smiled and clapped Entreri on the shoulder. "I told you to call me Sota, none of this 'most esteemed Uncle' nonsense." Sota stepped back and gestured inside. "Come in, come in."

He hesitated when his nephew stepped in and the mountain of a man behind him was revealed. After a moment, he nodded. "Hendricks." He acknowledged.

Hendricks nodded back as he stepped in. "Master Sota."

Sota eyed him as he stepped inside, but seemed to decide to ignore his presence and turned away. "Mom!" He shouted. "Entreri's here!"

Entreri heard the sound of water being turned off and hands being dried on and old wash cloth. "Entreri?" A withered old voice called from the kitchen. "Entreri! Come say hello to your grandma!"

Entreri walked into the kitchen and was assaulted by the smell of cooking food and a peppermint scented candle. He walked up to his grandmother and grabbed her hands and gave her a quick peck on each cheek. Grey streaked her hair, and there were shadows under her eyes, but she smiled at him.

"Don't you even start with, 'most honorable Grandmother', again." She rolled her eyes. "You say, 'Hello grandma, I missed you so much, can I have a cookie now?'"

Entreri cracked a smile and swept his Grandmother into a hug. "I am sorry, Grandma. I missed you so much! May I have a cookie now?"

She blushed fiercely. "Well, I sapose you can have one, but don't spoil your appetite for dinner."

Entreri smiled and grabbed a cookie from the batch on the counter. "I'm sorry, Grandmother. I am not staying for long."

She froze. "That's it, then. Your going, aren't you? Your going down the well."

Entreri looked at her. Didn't answer.

"I knew you'd come. After you sent that brute down a few days ago to do god only knows what, I knew it would only be a matter of time." She nodded at Hendricks as she said this, who shrugged unabashed. "What do want from there?"

Entreri didn't answer.

"Who do you want from there?" She corrected herself.

Entreri didn't answer. Her eyes glittered. "Him." The word dripped like poison off her lips.

He sighed. "Not for the reason you think."

She turned back to the dishes and began scrubbing with a vigor. "It would make me happy if you would not go."

Entreri sighed and sat down, putting his cookie on the counter. "I have to."

"What could he possibly do for you?" She demanded, frustrated. "He will not care about you."

"I care even less about him." Entreri said stiffly. "There is something I need from him. I'm not even going to tell him who I am."

She slammed the dish rag and plate into the soapy water with a snort. "That place brings nothing but sorrow and pain!"

His face held a careful blankness not normally presented to his family. "I came of that place. If not for the well, I would not have been born." Golden eyes were on her stiff back. "Do you really regret my birth that much, Most Honorable Grandmother?"

He heard her sniff and wipe her nose, and he smelled her tears. She turned around and whipped her hands on the front of her cloths and smiled a tired smile. She held out her hands for a hug. "I'm sorry, Entreri. You know I didn't mean that. Please, forgive me."

Entreri coolly held her gaze for a moment, then nodded, ignoring her outstretched arms. "You are forgiven."

The light left her eyes and her arms dropped. She wrong her hands nervously as he stood up and walked to the sliding door. "I apologize for not staying longer, Most Honorable Grandmother, but I must be going." His hand rested on the door knob.

"Wait!" She cried, reached for him, stopped herself. "I-I wish I could pack a lunch for you, but I know you don't eat much..."

"Hn."

She burst into motion suddenly. "So I will make something for Hendricks." She said determinedly. The bodyguard glanced up in surprise. "You might be superman, but Hendricks is only human."

Entreri lifted an eyebrow, glanced at the manservant, hesitated. "This...is perfectly acceptable." He nodded.

The woman was a whirlwind of motion, packing this and that and everything you could think of. "I'm giving you a first aid kid, too, just in case. And an umbrella for if rains. I know Entreri doesn't get sick, but do make him use it, Hendricks. I'll get so worried. And here, take some sunscreen. Entreri isn't effected, but I can't imagine the hell you'll have with without any hair. And I have some ramen for your Uncle, Entreri, and tea, I know you drink tea. And...Oh! You'll need something to carry this all around in. Where is that old backpack?"

She looked around and spotted a faded yellow backpack hanging from a hook near the door, just waiting to go on another adventure again after all it's years of neglect. Sota, standing off to the side, unhooked it and handed it to her with a smile. Somehow, she managed to fit everything inside, which was a magic even the half-daemon hadn't mastered yet. Hendricks looked on in some amusement and a little bit of uncertainty. He glanced at Entreri, but his boss was impassively waiting at the door, giving no cue to the large manservant.

The aged human sighed, gazing at the building backpack, eyes distant. "Doesn't this just bring back memories?" She asked, and Sota looked at his mother with a pained expression, then looked at Entreri, who didn't return his gaze. Entreri's Grandmother sighed, then heaved the bag up with two hands and gave it to the manservant, who held the thing away from his body with a strained expression. It looked tiny in his massive hands. He looked at Entreri, looked at the old woman, back to his boss, gave a little shrug, then bowed.

"Thank you, Lady Higurashi. You have no need to worry, for I have all ready gone ahead and transported everything we will require for our venture, but we will most certainly make use of the Lady's most generous gifts."

The old woman blushed. "Oh, I'm no Lady."

"You are the Most Honorable Grandmother of our Lord, Entreri. " Hendricks placed his hand over his heart in a gesture surprisingly similar to the hanyou's, and bowed. "Therefore, you are our Lady Higurashi."

She turned away and sniffed. "Go on already, then. Don't let me waste your time."

A small smile cracked his stiff demeanor, and he straightened up and walked to stand behind Entreri. The half-daemon looked up at him and gave a slight nod of approval before turning and striding out the door. Hendricks followed not far behind.

They entered the well house and looked down the steps to the old well, still standing after all this time. Shadows and darkness cluttered to old room, and creaks could be heard from every old piece of wood.

Gold eyes glittered dangerously from the shadow blocking the light streaming through the open doorway.

"It has been fifteen years." He said, voice toneless. "I will not make the same mistakes as last time."

And with that, he took one inhumanly graceful leap, black hair trailing behind him, a predatory gleam in his eyes, and disappeared into a flash of blue light. Hendricks followed at a more leisurely, human pace, and simply swung both legs over the side of the the well before disappearing after his Lord.

One lonely old woman watched quietly from the doorway as she was left behind again.

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**You know, I really hate those stories where something terrible happens to Kagome, like rape or suicide or torture, and then people write her mom all like 'oh, my poor baby' and then ten minuets later shes all 'yeah, sure, you can go back down the well, because I know you have to.' or some other reason for her to approve Kagome's return.  
**

**No mom is that understanding. Unless they hate their children.  
**

**Read and Review.**


	3. The Blade

**Got a few more spelling errors in this one, and I know I spelled Totosai wrong, but I will fix that later.**

**Enjoy.**

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Entreri landed softly on a bed of dead leaves and dried bones. Sunlight filtered down from above and reflected off golden eyes as he looked up. In one smooth motion, he was airborne and flying over the edge of the Bone Eater's Well. Expensive leather shoes touched down on soft grass, and a cool autumn breeze ruffled his long black hair.

Facing away from him, sitting cross-legged on the ground in front of a large tent pitched in the middle of the clearing, a man with silver hair waited for him. A sword sheath rested in his lap, old and worn and missing it's sword. Dog ears pricked forward attentively, InuYasha turned his head slightly at Entreri's approach.

"How is Kagome?" He asked.

"The same." Entreri answered.

InuYasha nodded, expression darkening. "Let's just do this already." He leaned forward, grunting, used Tetsigia's sheath to help him get up, and managed to stand, leaning heavily on his sword. His face tightened and he exhaled heavily. "Let's go." InuYasha's ears twitched atop his head, and he turned back to the well. His eyes narrowed.

A hand appeared on the edge of the well, and Hendricks pulled himself into the feudal era. He grunted as he stood and began brushing imaginary dust off his suit jacket, then proceeding to pull a white cloth out of his pocket and wiped his reflective sunglasses clean.

"Oh." InuYasha said, ears going flat against his head. "It's you." He turned to Entreri. "Why do we need him? A human will only get in our way."

Without looking up from his sunglasses, Hendricks commented, "The same could be said about a cripple."

InuYasha spun, growling, claws outreached, sharpened, and threatening. "What did you say, you useless ningen?"

"That is enough, InuYasha!" The hanyou jerked in surprise, recognizing something cold and commanding in that deep voice, something so familiar that when he turned, he half expected to see-

But no. It was just Entreri, looking at him with those familiar, frozen eyes. A near perfect copy of..._his_ eyes. But not the expression behind them. No, that was something all it's own. Something that burned with heat behind his frozen exterior, that..._ he_ could never be able to manage.

InuYasha shook himself. "But I-"

"No." That closed face and toneless voice and burning cold eyes. "No." He repeated. "And you." Entreri turned his gaze to Hendricks. "You will not treat my family with such disrespect, or you will be dismissed. InuYasha is right in that you are not absolutely necessary for this venture."

His eyes narrowed barley a fraction of a centimeter, the first expression he had sense coming out of the well. "Do not become a hindrance."

And with that, he turned on his heel, hair swirling, and disappeared into the tent.

InuYasha grumbled noncommittally and followed his rather commanding nephew into the tent. Hendricks followed up the rear with the faded yellow backpack thrown over his shoulder.

The inside of the tent rather resembled a commander's quarters, with maps and charts tacked firmly in place on a cork board in the corner. One entire wall of the place was covered by stacks and stacks of boxes, and a white marker board stood in front of all of it. High definition photographs were tacked to the thing with magnets, the ocotional note scrawled under a picture in black.

InuYasha wrinkled his nose as he entered. "We never needed any of this stuff in my day. I don't even know what half of it does."

Entreri, who sat at a traditional Japanese kotatsu in the middle of the room, glanced at the two as they entered, and then went back to studying the maps and charts tacked to the cork board across from him. "We have never faced such a foe before, and I know the exact purpose and use of everything in this room. Rest assured, Uncle. I know my business."

"I've faced worse than _him_ and come out on top." InuYasha snorted. "Hell. I've beat him myself a couple of times."

"Crippled, Uncle?" Entreri's eyes slid to focus on InuYasha. "And without the famous Tetsaigia? I intend no offense, but I do believe he has gotten stronger over the past twenty years, while you..." His eyes examined the simmering hanyou with detachment. "-have not." He finished.

InuYasha's ears twitched in annoyance, and his eyes glared daggers at Entreri. The years had done nothing to make him question his first impression he got of the boy when he had first met him at age three. That of a younger Sesshomeru with a less flamboyant appearance.

Looking at him now, he was suddenly struck once again by how much he resembled his father. Entreri's hair was black to Sesshoumeru's white, his face pale and smooth to Sesshomeru's exotic Taiyouki markings, his clothing futuristic and expensive to Sesshomeru's more traditional garb.

But his features...

If he didn't know better, InuYasha would say it was his half-brother sitting across from him, save for his hair color and bare face.

His eyes slowly lost their anger, and his body language relaxed, though Entreri gave no reaction to InuYasha's current passiveness. The half-daemon's amber eyes fell on one of the photos on the on the white board behind Entreri.

"You look just like him, you know."

Entreri blinked, his only reaction. He looked eerily similar to the photo just behind him and to the left, even sitting in the same position as Sesshoumeru, who unknowingly stared in the direction of the camera with the same impassive facade as his illegitimate son.

Hendricks, standing so quietly behind InuYasha that even his daemon hearing didn't notice the human, noted the similarity's, too. He was the one who had come early through the well to scout out their target, speak with InuYasha about gaining his assistance, and fetch the mirror shards.

For nearly a week, he had perused Sesshoumeru's group, tracking their movements, noting their habits, gathering surveillance. And through all that time, he was struck by just how much his Lord was like his father, not just in features, but in general barring, expression (or lack thereof), and attitude.

Watching Entreri now, unknowingly sitting in the perfect position for comparison with his father, he was once again struck by the surreality of it.

Entreri broke the spell of silence without commenting on his uncle's observation, appearing neither pleased nor diss-pleased by what was said. "Did you do what Hendricks asked of you?" He demanded.

"Yah." InuYasha said, brushing off his brief moment of insight. "Totosia agreed, and I didn't tell him who wanted it, just like you said. He's doing it as a favor to me, but he's still charging you for making him come out of retirement."

Entreri nodded. "And the other thing I requested you find for me?"

InuYasha's nose wrinkled at this. "Yah, ugly, fowl thing. It smelled horrible. What the hell do you need a dragon for?"

"You will come to come to see." Entreri said. "I have a small desire we not come to blows to get what I want, but if Sesshoumeru is anything like me when he is threatened, I doubt it. In the occurrence it does come to a fight between us, I will need that dragon."

"Feh! Whatever." He sniffed. InuYasha finally noticed the briefcase Entreri had been carrying laying at his side. His scowl deepened. "And that." He nodded at it. "That's another thing. Sense when has grave robbing been acceptable? What are you even going to use it for? It's broken."

Entreri looked at him, a dark light burning in otherwise expressionless eyes. "I'm having the shards melted together and forged into a blade."

InuYasha looked doubtful. "There isn't enough shards to make a whole blade, and whatever magic it had would shatter as soon it hit something."

Entreri raised an eyebrow. "Didn't I say it was going to be forged _into _a blade? The blade itself will be the base for the mirror."

"Well, what are you going to give Totosia to forge the other part of the blade with?"

"Hendricks." Entreri said. "The box."

A slight lifting at the corner of his lips. The first expression his nephew ever gave in his presence that could be compared to a smile. It had to be the creepiest thing InuYasha had ever seen, and he'd seen some crazy shit. His ears fell flat against his head.

Hendricks pulled an ornately carved box from under the single cot in the corner, different from the rest stacked along one wall, handling it with a delicate hand not many would guess he was capable of. He brought the box to the waiting Hanyou and placed it in the center of the kotatsu.

InuYasha examined it with some trepidation.

Entreri turned the box so it faced InuYasha, and lifted the lid, watching his Uncle's face the whole time. Slightly curious, InuYasha leaned forward and looked inside, to be greeted by the sight of two long, thin bones lying innocently on the floor of the box.

Tentatively, he reached a finger forward and lightly ran it down the length of one of the bones, a rib, he thought. As he did, he was struck by the suffocating sensation of being observed, weighed, measured. Like a bug about to be stepped on.

He quickly drew his hand back.

"What are they?" He asked suspiciously.

"Can you not smell it?" Entreri asked. InuYasha lightly sniffed the air around the box, and his eyes widened. He drew back quickly, the expression on his face caught between horror and amazement.

"You want Totosai to make you a sword out of your own ribs?" He gasped. Hendricks looked unsurprised by the revelation.

Entreri looked at him impassibly. "I have no fangs to give, and the loss of a few ribs will not impact me greatly. I am part Youki, and we have technologies in the future that can replace the ones I lost."

InuYasha's stare was still incredulous, and somewhat uncertain. "But... what is that evil aura I sense around them?" He asked.

"Evil?" Entreri asked, raising an eyebrow. "Well, I sapose it would be... that is my own Youki, which I wrapped around them when they were-" He hesitated. "-removed, in order to keep them alive and apart of me, so their potency may last until Totosia has them and forges them into a weapon."

InuYasha was shaking his head. "Couldn't you have used some other daemon's fangs? Ripping out your own ribs seems a little extreme."

"Can you think of a daemon with fangs strong enough to even phase Lord Sesshoumeru, but weak enough that it would not have been easier to skip the sword all together and just go after my father as we are?"

InuYasha hesitated a moment, thinking. "Yes!" He exclaimed, proud of himself. "Both my father, who is your grandfather, and the dragon daemon, Ryukotsusei, are much more powerful than you, and have easily accessible fangs to us. I can think of a hundred other strong daemons I have defeated that I know the grave sights of that could have been of use if you had just asked me."

Entreri was shaking his head before InuYasha had even finished. "It would have to have been from a live daemon equal to or stronger than Sesshoumeru, or it would not have any effect. And going after a daemon like the one I described would have been harder than going after Sesshomeru himself."

He shook his head again. "And before you say it, yes, the daemon _has _to be alive. Have you ever wondered why Sesshoumeru went through all the trouble of lusting after your sword for all that time, when he could have just taken a fang from your father's grave and made a new one all together?"

This gave InuYasha pause.

Entreri continued. "Well I'm sure it had something to do with you being undeserving of Tetsigia, even if Sesshoumeru didn't need it himself, it is also because such a sword forged from a dead daemon would have been useless. It has to be ether from a live daemon, or a part of that daemon that was covered in youkie energy before the daemon itself died. Anything else would have been inferior to a daemon as powerful as Sesshoumeru."

InuYasha's ears flattened against his skull. "Kagome has been telling you too many stories." He muttered.

A slight smile cracked Entreri's facade, so quickly InuYasha might have missed it.

It was the first time any sort of affection was shown to him by his last living relative, excluding his half-brother, in all the years they had known each other.

InuYasha smiled.

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	4. Bullets and Dragons

**Can I just say I love you guys?**

**Sorry for spelling. Anyone want to be a beta? :D**

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"You will go to Totsai, alone, without breathing a word of me."

Hendricks nodded. He had ditched the cheery, yellow backpack as soon as he could, and opted instead for a plainer, hiking bag. It now contained the box of Entreri's ribs and the briefcase of Kanna's mirror shards.

"Crazy kids." InuYasha muttered.

"By Youki standards, your not that old." Hendricks commented dryly.

"Yah, but by human standers I'm practically achient."

Entreri's cold eyes settled on the two. "Go. Now. I want to be able to make our first move by tomorrow. Make sure the sword smith knows of my urgency."

Hendricks immediately turned serious. He bowed respectfully. "Of course, my Lord. I will be off at once." He inclined his head stiffly to InuYasha. "Lord InuYasha."

"Feh. Good riddens."

Entreri's gold eyes lighted on InuYasha after the body guard had turned stiffly on his heels and walked off down the road. "Now then-" He said.

InuYasha shuddered. He did _not_ like that tone.

"Let us go and find that dragon."

...

Hendricks bought a horse at the first village he passed, and although he got many strange looks for his manner of dress and the strange pieces of glass he wore in place of eyes, he got through relatively unharrased. He rode hard for a couple hours, stopping only once to give the poor beast a rest, and continued as before.

It was nearly midday when he began to see smoke on the horizon, and smell ash and the bitter tang of metal. After kicking the horse into a run, it wasn't long before the sulfur fields came into view, spewing smoke that twisted and very nearly obscured the white skull of the giant daemon that Totosai resided in.

Hendricks slowed his horse to a trot as he approached, carefully steering the animal away from pieces of ground too hot to be safe for it, and dismounted as he got to the widely gaping jaws of the beastly skull.

He had not done any recon in his scouting the previous weeks on this...Totosia, this sword master, though he had heard enough tales from Entreri's mother, the Lady Kagome, to know he was good. But was he good enough for his Lord?

Sweat dripped down his cleanly shaven head as he stepped inside, noting the forge, the blades lining one wall of the dwelling, the three eyes cow blinking at him from across the room. He did not have the sharp eyes of a daemon, but if one could see his flat, brown orbs behind the sunglasses, one would notice the quickness with witch he surveyed his surroundings, taking in every detail.

"Hmm. So are you him, then? This mysterious warrior InuYasha roped me into making a sword for?"

Hendricks turned, not letting his surprise show, for there at the entrance stood a hunched old man in a green striped outfit, lugging a long, silver hammer over his shoulder.

_Old Daemon._ Hendricks corrected himself, noting the elvish points of his ears.

"No." He said. Hendricks swung the bag off his shoulder and placed it on the floor, then pulled both the box and the briefcase out of the backpack. He handed them over to Totosai, who barley glanced at them. "My master is. I'm here to deliver the materials for the sword."

"Hmm. Yet I can tell you are a strong warrior. Tell me, what is you weapon of choice? Obviously not a swordsmen. Those guys never step three feet out their own door without something to hack people up with."

"This conversation is unrelated to the business at hand." Hendricks reached into his suit and pulled out a small, feudal style money bag. He held it out to the sword master. "Your payment. The rest will be given on completion of the sword."

Totosai's hand shot out and twisted Hendricks hand around, palm up. The bag dropped to the ground with a faint clink. Totosai took a quick look at the bodyguard's calusced palm, only to find himself in a heap on the floor with his entire arm twisted around the back of his head in a killer hold.

"Hmm. Not a spear man or halberd barer. They have stronger hands and tougher palms." The old man seemed stupidly oblivious to his situation. Hendricks looked unamused.

"No." He scratched his head with his one free hand. "Not a bow man, either."

"I hope you realize the only reason your still alive is because my master wants that sword. Keep in mind that you are neither the best nor the only maker of daemon weapons in the land. You are not abslotuly necessary."

"Ha! I have it!" Totosai snapped his fingers. "Your a rifle man, aren't you? You reek of gun powder."

Hendricks pushed the old man away with a snort. Totosai rolled with the movement and jumped back to his feet with surprising vigor.

"Do you have yours with you? I would like to see one of these new inventions from the continent. Pfft! All the humans are saying they are going to replace swords someday." Totosai snorted. "As if! One daemon sword could take down a whole army of guns!"

"Old man," Hendricks began wearily. "I don't have time for your nonsense. Will you make the weapon, or will you not?"

"Oh, sure, sure." The old sword smith picked up the box and briefcase from the floor and placed them on the edge of the forge. "What is this, anyway?" He asked, examining the sleek, black briefcase. "How do you open it?"

Hendricks, stiffly, without a word, flipped the laches on the thing and reveled the smoky surface of the mirror shards. Totosai whistled.

"Now that's some high quality mirror daemon! Did you intentionally seal it's soul in there, or did it flee into it's mirror when you killed it?"

Hendricks blinked. "It's soul?" And then, indigently- "We didn't kill it! It was already dead!"

"Hmm. That will probably make it more inclined to listen to us, then." He shook his head in exasperation. "But honestly! How can you not notice the soul was still there?"

The old sword smith picked up a shard and examined it. "Reforging a soul will be harder than reforging a mirror, but it can be done. Most of the really powerful swords are sentient anyways."

"So it will have a will of it's own?" Hendricks asked, dismayed.

"Yep. But if your master has the strength of will, he can master it. Just don't let a human touch it until it has been subdued by the daemon it was intended for." Totosai glanced sharply at the big man. "It is intended for a daemon, yes? It's unusual for a human to be employed by such a creature."

Ignoring his question, Hendricks turned to the box laying on the edge of the forge. "And these?" He asked, popping the lid to reveal the two ribs. "Will these be any problem?"

The old sword smith picked up a bone held it up for close inspection. "Hmm. These are hanyou bones, but with the aura of a daemon? And a powerful one, at that! Why would your master put his youki in hanyou bones? But the power...I haven't felt anything like this sense-" He stopped abruptly.

Hendricks smirked. Only he knew the aura around the bones was that of what could possibly be the most powerful half-daemon alive. It warmed him to know that even an old, wise daemon was fooled into believing his Lord's powerful youki was that of a full blooded daemon.

"But..no. That spoiled bastard already has a sword."

The smirk dropped slightly. He could well imagine whose aura Lord Entreri's reminded the sword smith of.

"Nope." Totosai shook his head. "Not a problem, though the effect would be more potent if full blooded youki bones were used. But forget that!" Totosai clapped his hands together. "I have a proposition for you!"

One, single eyebrow could be seen arching over Hendricks sunglasses in question.

"With the amount of bone here, and the measurements of the sword you gave me, there should be-" A quick re-examination of one of the ribs took place. "About two inches of bone left over after the thing is made."

Hendricks listened carefully.

"With my admittedly pitiful knowledge of guns, I'd say that could make about two or three musket balls."

Hendricks could start to see where this was going. A wolfish smile grew on his face.

"I'll let you have these for no charge. You get them when you come to pick up the sword. If you decide you like them, well hell! I have myself a regular customer! If not, no harm, no foul. But...!"

Here, Hendricks frowned.

"But! This only happens if you let me watch what these guns fulled by daemon fire can do! Ha! Guns replace swords, they say! Well, if a weapon can be infused with youki energy, that's the day I'll believe it!" Totosai snorted.

Hendricks, himself confident in the future, smiled with teeth. "Care to make a bet on that?" He asked.

"Feh!" He huffed. "As if! Your on!"

The bodyguard smiled. "Come find me in five hundred years so you can give me my winnings."

"Ha! Five hundred years! Your just trying to cheat me out of my money! You'll be dead in five hundred years!"

Hendricks shrugged innocently. "Stranger things have happened. And do, with alarming regularity."

"Hmm. What ever." Totosai said doubtfully. "Oh, and a warning." Here, he turned serious. "If you do decide to have more rifle balls made from daemon parts, make sure you purify the carcass before you bring it to me. Human's can't effectively use daemon weapons unless they have been specially treated. I know a slayer in a village of slayers who used to be very good at such things. I can have her look after things for you, if you want."

Hendricks nodded. "I know of this...slayer you speak of." He said, testing the word. "I will actully be meeting with her later today, and if given the chance, I will inquire after the subject."

Totosai knodded, then sighed. "Well, I sapose you want these by sunrise tomorrow, am I right? It's always the very next day they want a weapon of mass destruction!"

Hendricks smiled grimly and nodded affirmative. He reached into the inside of his coat and pulled out what looked to Totosai like a smaller, sleeker version of the rifles he had seen. The sword master eyed the device curiously.

Hendricks pulled out the clip from his gun and selected a single bullet from his arsenal. "Here." He said, handing it to Totosai. "Use this as a model for the other ones. My gun doesn't take musket balls."

"Hmm. Alright then, I'll get to work." That enormous hammer was brought up, ready to go to go. Hendricks slung his now empty backpack over his shoulder and started out after the poor horse, who had been sweating in the burning field that whole time.

Silhouetted by smoke, Hendricks faced his steed to the west. He wondered how Lord Entreri's venture was going while he was at Totosai's?

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	5. Power Barely Glimpsed

**Here yah go, you little termites.**

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InuYasha wrinkled his nose. "What do you plan to do? You don't even have a weapon!"

Entreri glanced at him briefly before turning his attention back to the field below them. "I am a hanyou. I do not need the weapons of man to slay a foe such as this."

They stood on a cliff overlooking a large, open space. Dried, brown grass grew in clumps, ocationaly visible through noxious fumes that rose up through the ground and clouded the sky. The earth rumbled as they stood there, and InuYasha staggered for a moment before he found his balance. Entreri, however, remained perfectly stationed.

"Hmff." InuYasha huffed. "Don't expect any help from me when you get your ass kicked."

"How eloquently put, Uncle." Entreri commented dryly.

The ground shuddered again, this time accompanied by a cloud of gaseous poison that billowed in great waves into the sky. InuYasha cursed and leaned heavily on Tetsuigia's hilt.

"How do you plan to provoke it out of the ground?" InuYasha asked.

That devious smile again.

"Watch."

Entreri was airborne then, almost floating down the side of the cliff. He touched down briefly on the ball of his foot, and then he was moving, running forward so fast, even InuYasha could only see the after image he left behind.

Running across the field, Entreri held his arm out to the side of him with his fingers held stiffly in place, a knife made of flesh and bone. InuYasha watched, astonished, as black flames licked at the air in a trail behind his fingertips, a wave of heat blurring the air around him.

Entreri jumped and brought both his hands up above his head, and for the fraction of a second before gravity took over, he hung suspended in the air with his black hair whipping wildly and a column of black flames held ready above his head. And then, he brought the whirlwind of dark fire crashing down, _into_ the ground. Earth exploded upwards, and there was a roar of sound deafening to the two Hanyous.

Entreri, sizing up the field, had already determined what tunnel entrance would offer the most exposure to his Dark Fire through the underground labyrinth, and this was where he concentrated the burnt of his attack. From there, physics took over. The fire only had one place to go, that is, down and out. It ate through the tunnels, ocationaly bursting up through the ground in places where the tunnels came too close to the surface.

InuYasha, watching from the clifftop, was amazed at the sheer amount of ground his Nephew's attack was capable of eating through. It was only at that moment that he began to believe they might actually pull off the heist they were planing. InuYasha's own natural attacks, the Iron Reaper and Blades of Blood, didn't even come close to the magnitude of power he was witnessing, and Entreri hadn't even gotten his sword yet, normally the main source of power for Youkis.

The ground groaned, shook, and at one point, exploded upwards in an avalanche of stone and Black Fire. A shape could be seen thrashing behind a cloud of noxious green fumes, obviously reptilian and somewhat resembling a serpent. Great, beasial roars could be heard, echoing back and forth with the furry of a daemon scorned.

Entreri stood, unflinching. His lips were pulled back from his teeth, and though he sported no fangs, InuYasha shuddered at the sheer, joyous _hunger_ in his Nephew's yellow eyes.

The dragon, a great, nauseous green thing covered in spikes, uncurled itself and and glared at Entreri with hateful black eyes.

"_Whelp!" _The voice shuddered through the air, though the dragon itself didn't move it's hungry, snapping jaws in speech. _"Does a mere half-daemon dare challenge the great Kibadoku?"_

Entreri flexed the fingers of his left hand, flames once again beginning to crawl over his skin, enveloping his fingertips.

"You are filth."

The dragon reared it's head back at this. _"You dare insult me, the Joutei Tatsu of the South?" _ Stinging fumes rose from the dragon's nostrils. _"Die! Insolent Hanyou!"__  
_

The dragon, Kibadoku, roared and struck, it's enormous, wolfish head shooting forward like a snake. It struck the ground where Entreri had been standing just a moment before, and pulled it's head back in confusion when it found the Hanyou had disappeared.

"Vermin."

The serpent's head jerked up in surprise at the voice, finding Entreri coming at him from above. Entreri's hand was curled into a fist, trailing Dark Flame. The strike landed right in Kibadoku's malevolent black eye, and where the fire left Entreri's control and caught on the beast's skin, it turned yellow and smoked something awful.

A great scream ripped the air, ringing in InuYasha's ears. Entreri pulled back, flying away from the dragon and landing gracefully on the tips of his toes. His eyes were closed as he listened to the screams and thrashing of the great Kibadoku.

The dragon whipped it's head around, yellow flames still licking at it's eye. It's head lowered, and one clawed appendage was rubbed against the stinging fires. It raised it's head after a moment, one eye now closed and leaking blood and eye fluid, still smoking but no longer on fire. Kibadoku pulled it's lips back from it's fangs, poisonous saliva dripping from it's jaws that vaporized into green fumes when it touched the ground. It joined green fumes already soaked into the ground and staining the air of the battle field.

_"Whelp." _Kibadoku panted, voice tinged with a growl. _"For this insult, you will die."_

Those deadly sharp jaws opened wide and a cloud of the dragon's poison shot out like high powered steam, completely enveloping Entreri in a rolling cloud of acidic poison. Rock was blasted away with the sheer force of the stuff, and the surrounding landscape just melted into goo._  
_

InuYasha noted the effects of this with a kind of horrified interest. _So a concentrated blast of Kibadoku's poison will melt even rock, just like Sesshoumeru's..._

"Pathetic."

InuYasha watched in amazement as a sudden whirlwind of fire broke through the hailstorm of poison, until Kibadoku snapped his jaws closed and the after effects dissolved away around Entreri's youki. The hurricane of Dark Fire died down to a dull simmer, and only then did Entreri's eyes open with a flash of gold in the wavering flame.

"And you dare call yourself a _Joutei_, a lord." Entreri raised his hand before him and shifted each finger around in it's socket until it popped with an loud _crack. _

Kibadoku snorted and bared his fangs.

"Die, like the worm you are."

With that, he flew off the ground at the dragon, blunt fingernails extended and glowing with black flames. Kibadoku roared and lunged at the airborne Hanyou, acid dripping from his salivating fangs. InuYasha watched, amazed, as his Nephew drew close to the maw of the beast and then with a sudden blur of inhuman speed, he flew _into_ it's maw, that same smug smile on his handsome face.

From his vintage point, it looked to InuYasha like Entreri, viable as only a flickering black shadow against the glowing green smoke, flew past the shadow Kibadoku. In a moment, however, it became apparent that he had not been propelled past the head of the dragon, but _through_ it.

Kibadoku's long neck was still for a moment, jaws open wide in a frozen grimace. A great shudder ran down it's spine, and then it's enormous mass crashed into the ground with a great cloud of dust and acid vapor. Entreri stood where he had landed, his back to the mound of flesh that had been Kibadoku. He carelessly flicked a spot of gore from his shoulder.

"InuYasha." His silvery ears flattened against his head at Entreri's call.

"Come help me with this."

InuYasha sighed, and studied the cliff with trepidation. He finally just jumped and landed awkwardly using Tetsuigia's sheath as a sort of cane. He grimaced, but began the trek across the field to his Nephew, who waited patently with his arms crossed.

"So?" Entreri asked at his approach. He had an eyebrow raised. "What do you think? Good enough to face my Father?"

InuYasha blinked. "Sesshoumaru has the power to kill a thousand daemons in a single strike of his Bakusaigia. It's going to take a little bit more than some magic fire to bring him down."

Entreri's face smoothed back into it's usual pale and perfect mask. InuYasha raised his hands up in surrender. "Not to say your not incredibly powerful in your own right! Now that me and Tetsuigia are out of the picture, your likely one of the most rawly powerful half-daemons around. But your still only _half _daemon, only _half _Sesshoumaru."

"Hmm." Entreri's head tilted and his eyes narrowed.

"Hehehe-" InuYasha laughed uncertainty, backing away slowly. "But we don't necessarily have to fight him head on to get-"

"InuYasha."

He flinched. "Yes?"

"When did you get so..."

InuYasha sighed. "Cautious? Useless? Passive?"

Cold, golden eyes studied him. "Wary."

IunYasha turned away. "When I spent twenty years limping around and relying on others."

Entreri studied him a moment longer, and then turned to the horse he had ridden on. From it's saddle bag, he produced a long, thin hunting knife.

"Your friend," He began. "She is sure this will cut through the hide?"

InuYasha glared at him, annoyed. "Of course it will. Hasn't your mother ever told you about Sango? If she says it will cut through dragon scales, it will cut through dragon scales."

"Of course, Uncle. Whatever you say." Entreri then turned away and approached the still steaming corpse of Kibadoku. His own youki lightly flared to life in response to the vaporous acids leaking from the body, protecting him in the form of simmering Dark Fire. Up close, InuYasha noted that although it flickered dangerously and had apparently burned the dragon, he felt no heat from the flames, and they did not burn Entreri's expensive (though blood covered) suit.

The first strike of the long knife landed on the side of the beast, above the stomach but below the back, and was accompanied by an outpouring of acid blood hissing out and vaporizing into the air. Entreri proceeded to cut a square of hide out of Kibadoku's scales as tall as a man and twice as wide.

"You know," InuYasha began. "When you asked me for something that could cut through dragon scales, I thought you were going to use it to kill the thing, not go at it with your bare hands and skin it like a trophy."

"Not a trophy." Entreri grunted. "Armor."

InuYasha's eyes widened as understanding hit home."They use the same kind of poison...the dragon and your father. His whip, his claws...maybe even his sword will be deflected, if not rendered entirely useless with armor like that."

"Exactly." Entreri began peeling the cut off bit of hide from the still steaming meat. InuYasha shook his head in admiration.

"Why didn't I ever plan like you in my fighting days?"

"Because." Entreri grunted and stepped back as a hundred pounds of scale-hide armor was suddenly dropped in his arms. "You had a giant sword to hide behind twenty years ago."

Entreri rolled up his prize like an old rug and through it over his shoulder like it was nothing. Without another word, he started back through the poison soaked planes to the horses they had left on the clifftop.

InuYasha sighed, tightened his grip on Tetsuigia's sheath, and began the long trudge back.

"Bastard didn't even need my help. He just wanted to show off."

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	6. A Darkness Inside

**Looong chapter here.  
**

**To answer a question: I like to think of Entreri's Dark Fire as the demon ability he has, like Sesshoumeru has the poison and InuYasha has the Iron Reaper (Reaver?), even though as far as I'm aware, no one else in their family has those ability's. I noticed powers are not usually passed on to offspring in InuYasha's world. Power _level_ is, strong demons produce strong demons, but usually they don't pass down specific ability's.**

**It is not a trait passed down from Kagome, though we do get to that later on.  
**

**Enjoy.**

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They met Hendricks on their way to the Slayers Village.

He just rode right up to them from an adjoining road, as if he had been there the whole time. Entreri, taking the lead, didn't glance at him. InuYasha stared at him as he trotted up on his horse level with him, behind and to the right of Entreri.

"How did you know where we-" InuYasha began, then stopped himself. "..you know what? Never mind."

Hendricks ignored him.

InuYasha, getting a little uncomfortable with the silence after a while, said, "So how did the meeting with Totosai go?"

InuYasha couldn't see Hendricks glance from behind his sunglasses, but he felt the weight of his stare, nonetheless. His ears drooped a little. Hendricks remained stoic and annoyed, and Entreri continued on in front of them like he couldn't hear.

A few more minuets of this, and InuYasha spoke up again. "So is anyone going to tell me the plan yet? You know he's not just going to hand it over, even if you are his son."

Hendricks didn't even grace him with a glare this time, and the silence continued to remain unbroken except by the clip-clop of the horses hoves and the ocational bird. InuYasha began to get a little twitchy.

"So." He forced false cheer into his voice. "Sango said we can-"

"InuYasha."

That damn voice, so cold.

"Shut up."

His ears drooped even lower. Sense when had he become the one to be picked on in the group? That used to be Shippo's job, before...

He sighed. Before their lives had been blown to hell in one night nobody could remember. He'd never admit it, but sometimes he still missed toughing it in the wilderness with his friends, poor old Miroku getting a hand to the face every time he gave a hand to Sango's ass, gentle Kagome, and yes, even annoying little Shippo. Thinking these things, forgetting Entreri's warning, and wanting conversation like the good old days, InuYasha stupidly opened his mouth and blurted out the first thing that came to mind.

"I wish Kagome was well enough to be here."

He imidetly regretted what came out of his mouth, and flinched in reflex. He was suddenly aware of an absence in the air, and he floundered for a moment before he realized what it was. Entreri was restraining his aura to the point where it could not even be felt, and unfortunately for them, it just made the two men behind him even more aware of just _whose _son was riding in front of them, that his aura was so strong, even when not in use, that it's absence was noticeable to even a ninjin like Hendricks. Somehow, InuYasha thought this was even worse than if he had turned around and blasted him with Dark Fire.

"I mean-ah...not to say, or imply...you know-" InuYasha floundered. Hendricks took pity on him and slapped the back of his head, shutting him up fast. InuYasha glared at him, but quickly turned back to Entreri when he spoke.

"Hn." He said, in a perfectly normal, neutral tone. "Well that is what we came here for, is it not?"

And with that, he kicked his horse into a light jog, pulling even farther ahead of the group and disappearing around a corner. InuYasha slapped himself in the face. Hendricks watched him with unreadable eyes, hidden in shadow. "You made the Master feel terrible enough about the incident with his Lady Mother when it happened, there is really no reason to keep mentioning it every ten minuets."

"I know." InuYasha moaned. "I'm an idiot. Please, for the love of God, just stab me now before Entreri gets his hands on me!"

"There is a new spin on that saying in the future." Hendricks said, turning his attention back to the road. "It's, 'shoot me now', instead of 'stab me'." Hendricks then kicked his horse into a trot after his Master, leaving with these parting words. "And I would love to shoot you, InuYasha. But I'm afraid Lord Entreri might get cross that I took his sport away."

And InuYasha gulped, because he really wasn't sure if that was a joke or not.

They arrived at nearly sunset to be greeted by spears and swords being waved at them from the ramparts of the wall protecting the town, a huge, sprawling expanse of buildings that had overgrown their old walls several times over, leaving the newest one thirty feet high and reenforced with steel bases and brackets. Hendricks noted both Entreri and InuYasha sniffing a little as the gates came into view, and concluded that the metal for the defenses was made with the bones of demons.

_Hmm._ He thought._ If anywhere had purified demon parts, this would be it._

The gang reined in their horses and stood, Entreri impassive. Hendricks rode ahead of him and placed himself somewhere between out of Entreri's way and in the way of any objects that came raining down at them. Entreri glanced at the mob cursing and shouting at them, then looked away, as if the scenery was more interesting.

"Hold!" Hendricks shouted, and amazingly the crowd quieted and settled for glares and hushed murmurs.

"What is all this then?" He continued. "We come with peaceful intentions to trade fairly. What cause have you to be here?"

That caused a round of jeers and a couple of rocks to be thrown at the party of three, none of which managed to hit Entreri, luckily (for the villagers, that is.) Finally, the crowd settled into silence as they seemed to agree on a general speaker for themselves.

"You come accompanied by Demons!" The man shouted. "Need we any other reason?"

At this, InuYasha felt he had had enough. He rode forward as well, inadvertently placing himself in Entreri's way. "Oi!" He shouted at the men. "Don't you idiots know who I am? I helped rebuild this town with my bare hands! I am InuYasha, who killed the evil Hanyou, Naraku, the one who destroyed this place. For god's sake! I was here just last week, talking with Sango!"

A gasp escaped the mouths of the crowd, and one nameless man shouted, "You see there, Lee? I told you Lady Sango consorted with Demons!"

"Yes, it appears so. This is sad news indeed." The speaker, Lee, said, shaking his head and utterly failing to hide the gleeful smile from his face. InuYasha pulled his ears back and growled at him.

"It's going to attack!" Someone screamed. "Kill it! Kill it!"

"I'm not attacking you fucking idiots! Didn't you hear what I just said?" InuYasha shouted. "Where the hell is Sango, anyway? Why isn't she here?"

"We don't know who the hell you are!" One crowd member shouted. "We are a town of Demon slayers! A half-demon had nothing to do with rebuilding the town after the Great Demon Massacre!" A round of agreement came after this statement.

"Demon, you have just doomed the Lady Sango with your testament!" The speaker shouted.

"Testament?" InuYasha asked. "What testament?"

"You folks know the penalty for aiding a demon!" Speaker Lee gleefully addressed the crowd. "You herd it from the half-breed's own mouth! Lady Sango is-"

A great whop-whop-whoosh interrupted whatever speech the one called Lee was trying to make as an enormous boomerang flew over his head, missing him by inches and smashing through an empty watch tower on it's roundabout back to it's thrower, someone in the crowd of people atop the ramparts hidden from view to the three travelers.

InuYasha watched as the crowd parted like water around the figure of a woman walking to the Speaker Lee, that same boomerang held behind her back.

"Lady Sango is what, _Practitioner _Lee?" An icy voice whipped out.

Practitioner Lee watched in dismay as the woman, Sango, InuYasha knew, walked right up to him and stared him in the eye. She was taller than him, tough shorter than much of the rest of the crowd. It was hard to tell, though, from the way those near her shrank away from her cold brown eyes.

"_Lady_ Sango," He said this sarcastically. "I was saying, is to be put on trial for betraying us to the Demons, and dealing out weapons to our enemy!"

A gasp of shock went through the crowd at this, and Practitioner Lee practically flourished under weight of horrified stares directed at Sango. "Yes!" He chortled maliciously. "It is true, as Brother Yu has declared! The Lady Sango not only consorts with Demons, but intended to forge a weapon for one!"

"Say it isn't true!" A woman's voice wailed.

"Tell them, Lady Sango!" A voice cried out. "Tell them you would never!" A chorus of agreement was herd, though not as loud as when they had been baying for the Hanyou's blood.

Sango was silent a moment, observing the crowd with cool, collected eyes. "I was not going to make a-"

"But surly," Practitioner Lee interrupted, to Sango's anoyence. "You can't deny this accusation? These half-breeds came here with your name on their lips and a bundle of unpurified demon carcass, not only beckoning to any two-bit youki that wanders by with it's aura, but with the intention of forging them a great weapon?."

Murmurs ran through the crowd, and Sango's eyes narrowed. "Open your eyes, Lee!" The slayer gestured to Entreri and the bundle of Kibadoku's hide on the horse behind him. Entreri himself had been studying the woman sense she had appeared, apparently loosing interest in the scenery. "That is the hide of a dragon, as any two-bit _Practitioner _would know, and a poison one at that, am I right?"

Sango glanced at Entreri for the first time then, and her eyebrows drew together in confusion for a moment after she got a good look at the Hanyou InuYasha had asked her to forge a knife for, hard enough to cut dragon scales. Entreri remained cold and aloof, as if the whole thing just bored him. He nodded, though, at her question, and Sango shrugged it off and turned back to the crowd.

"You are slayers!" She shouted. "You know the best of our Practitioners would have had trouble fighting such a foe, and I'd be willing to bet he did it single handedly, too."

"And with his bare bare hands!" InuYasha shouted trying to be helpful. Sango glanced at the tall, handsome stranger with surprise. She had assumed that he had used the knife, as she could not see any other weapon on him. But she now realized the knife her old friend had asked of her was to skin the beast, not kill it. The crowd reacted with fear, and a little bit of envy.

"There you have it!" She shouted, quieting the crowd. "These are some of the most powerful beings in the land-" She stretched the truth a little here, as she really didn't know, but then again, the angry mob didn't need to know that. "And I can personally attest to the fact that the Hanyou, InuYasha, did help me rebuild _your home _with his bare hands after the defeat of the Monster, Naraku, at _our _hands."

The crowd, a little abashed now, began murmuring quietly again.

"Well that's all well and good!" Practitioner Lee said, annoyed. "But the law is the law, and you still have to face the crimes you have committed." A gentle mutter of agreement.

Sango stared him down, and Lee looked away first. "Very well." She said, and InuYasha turned his head sharply. "I will stand before the Practitioners for judgment, however, until I am found guilty, I am still Lady and ruler of the this town, if only in name. And my guests will be staying the night at the manor."

She turned behind her, where InuYasha couldn't see behind the wall, and called out, "Open the gate!"

There was some grumbling, some hesitance, but eventually the great gates of Demon bone were raised, and the troupe began a cautious trot forward. They were greeted by stony silence and cold faces that watched their every move. Sango jumped straight down from the ramparts, not bothering with the stairs, and walked up to them with her back straight and her eyes flashing.

"Lady Sango." She stiffened at the Practitioner's call, but did not turn. "I will see you at dawn."

Sango gave no retort to his jibe, and instead walked ahead and grabbed Entreri's reins, sensing him to be the leader of the group, and began to show them the way through orderly streets and smoking pipe stacks. The other horses fell into place behind them, finally bearing their less than human riders to their destination.

"Sango," InuYasha began. "What-"

"Shhh!" She hissed, glancing around. "Not here. Not now. Later, in a safer place."

InuYasha glanced around nervously, noticed Hendricks and Entreri looked brave and unconcerned, and straightened up quickly, resisting the urge to turn around every few seconds. This was not a friendly place for Demons, not a friendly place at all.

Later, they passed through two more gates, each marking the place where the village had overgrown it's previous boundaries and morphed into a town. The last gate led into a wide yard filled with yellow wildflowers that danced into wind and flared in the sunset colors. Though it was still imposable to miss the double rows of old graves that lined one part of the yard. Except for the ruined buildings and broken gates, InuYasha noted, it was still exactly the same as it was twenty three years ago, when he had first come to the slayers village in search of jewel shards, and instead found a lifelong friend.

He glanced at Sango worriedly as a stable boy ran forward eagerly and led their horses away as they dismounted. It had been less than a week sense he had come at the request of his nephew, delivered through Hendricks, to find him a poisonous dragon and a weapon that could cut through it's hide. One week sense he had last come to the Slayer's town, a place he remembered as a race of diligent, hard working people dedicated to their craft. One week sense he had last seen his old friend give her tired smile.

Something had gone horribly wrong in his absence.

It was only later, after they had been shown their rooms and Entreri had gone to the bath house to bathe the blood and gore off his skin, that they finally managed to meet up in a room prepared with tea and some feudal style cushions to kneel on. Entreri sat on his like a throne raised above all the others, though they were all on the floor, and Hendricks stayed in the far corner of the room, in the optimal position to defend the occupants should the need arise.

InuYasha, slouching and a little uncomfortable, was the first to speak. "Sango, what happened sense I left? They had no problem with me when I was here last week."

"Rebellion like that doesn't just spring up in a week." Hendricks said, maintaining his rigorous attention. "It takes years to build up supporters, get funding, bribe officials to let you get away with it."

Sango snapped her attention away from Entreri, who she had been staring at with a puzzled expression. Her eyes sharpened as she looked at Hendricks from under magenta eyelids.

"You know an awful lot about this kind of thing." She commented.

Hendricks shrugged. "I get around."

"Hmm." She muttered. "Well, in any case, your right about that. This has been building for years, but it's only become official sense Practitioner Lee decided to lead it."

"What's a Practitioner anyway? I haven't really paid attention to town politics when I visit." InuYasha said.

"Hmff." Sango snorted. "Don't we know it. You just come for the free food and comfy bed." She shook her head, but her eyes smiled. "Practitioners are...Elders, of a sort, though you don't actually have to be old to be one. They are respected for being either a master Demon hunter, or master forger. Lee, like myself, is both. He studied under me for many years."

Her eyes turned bitter. InuYasha squirmed uncomfortably, while Entreri sipped tea and appeared to ignore them.

"It has been a quiet sort of thing, and I believe Lee intended to build it for many more years before he decided to attempt a coup."

InuYasha choked on the tea he was drinking.

"But recent events were too good a chance to pass up, I'm afraid." Sango continued, unconcerned.

"Sango," InuYasha began when he could. "We didn't tip this whole thing off by coming here, did we?"

She sighed. "No, InuYasha, though you probably could have come at a better time. I wasn't expecting you back for a while yet, you usually put a few weeks between visits."

"I'm sorry, Sango." InuYasha said. "It wasn't until after Entreri here killed the dragon that he told me why we had to in the first place, and then I realized we'd have to come back to have the scales forged. I couldn't give you a warning."

"It's really not your fault, InuYasha." Sango said, giving him a tired smile. The only kind of smile, InuYasha realized, he had seen from her in the past few years. "Practitioner Lee had already decided to announce he would have me publicly tried by the other Practitioners before you walked in. You were just icing on the cake."

"How did this start?" InuYasha asked. "I thought the people that migrated here after we rebuilt loved you! You taught them to be slayers, to not be afraid of Demons anymore!"

"Yes," Sango said, "But InuYasha, humans have such a short memory, and these years have been harsh. One demon rampage after another we've had to put down, and people are mad and irrational right now. All of the children of the town recently died."

"What?"

"It was a demon, clever enough to slip past our defenses. I have a way in through the wards for Hatchi and Kilala, and other demons I know that mean no harm when they visit on ocation. The people knew this, and didn't like it. Before the incident after you left, Lee was already building a case against me, saying I'm a traitor for taking in demons. And then this youki slips through. I was actually the one who let him in, did you know that? It was me who opened the door for him."

"Sango, you didn't-"

"I know, I know. But of course Brother Yu was watching, the little creep. He's always watching me, waiting for me to mess up so he can report to Lee. And then all the children just up and die, I'll not tell you how, but believe me when I say it was messy. We killed the demon, of course, but word still got out that it was my fault."

"Sango, it wasn't your-"

"I know that." She was annoyed now. "Riots and complaints have been going on and off for the past two days straight, and the people are scared and stupid. They'll even listen to an idiot like Lee, and he knows it. What he'll have a problem with is when they stop panicking and overcome their grief, because then they won't have clouded judgments anymore and they'll wonder why they ever listened to him in the first place."

She sighed and looked mournfully at her untouched teacup. "I'll have to work all through the night to finish that..." She looked at Entreri then. "that...what was it you wanted me to make out of that dragon scale hide?"

"Armor." Entreri said, slowly opening his eyes. He put down the teacup he had been breathing in and looked at her, really looked at her for the first time. "I came for armor."

"Your eyes." Sango murmured. "You have InuYasha's eyes-but with something..."

Entreri didn't exactly sigh, but he came pretty close."Yes, I would be disappointed if you didn't find me familiar, you seem to be a clever ninjin. I have been told that I do, in fact, resemble my father, who you have met, I believe."

"But who..." Sango glanced at InuYasha for a moment, looked back at Entreri's features. Thought the features of the one she had in mind and Entreri were eerily similar, it was really the expression on the face that gave it away. Or the lack of expression, anyway.

"Sesshoumeru." Sango breathed. Entreri flexed a jaw muscle at the name, but admitted that yes, he was the son of the dog demon. Sango was dazed.

"He didn't strike me as the one to..." She trailed off, studying him with new eyes.

"To go cavorting with humans?" Entreri asked with a raised eyebrow. InuYasha's ears once again began to flatten against his head. They had been doing that a lot sense his nephew had come to the feudal era.

"To have children." Sango corrected with a slight blush.

"I know what you meant."

"So...do you mind if I ask who...?" Sango began vaguely.

Entreri studied her without resentment, without pain.

"Kagome."

Sango blinked. "No, Kagome would never..." She began, hoping this was some kind of joke, but trailed off into silence as a realization hit her. "How old are you?" She asked suddenly.

A slow blink. "Twenty."

Sango began counting backwards in her head, lining up the dates, subtract nine months...

"That night." She gasped. "That night no one can remember. That was what happened to Kagome? I always knew _something _had...but this? That..._beast _took her?" She flinched. "I mean... not that-"

"Yes." Entreri said, with even less emotion, if that were possible. "I have been told of this night by my Mother, Kagome, before. The night of no memory. That night when...the monk, i believe? Killed your brother, and you killed him, and my adopted brother, the kitsune, disappeared, and InuYasha attacked my father's ward. And it is also the night my Father raped my Mother, and conceived me."

A long, looong silence descended after that, in which Entreri poured more tea for himself and began to sip it with little regard for the the others awkwardness. InuYasha, mumbling some excuse, slipped out the door after awhile and went to bed, having had enough of, "Fucking p.m. half-demons and their daddy issues", as he put it in his mind, but dared not speak aloud.

"I apologize for my inquiry." Sango said after a while. "It really was none of my business."

Entreri sipped his tea quietly, and chose not to acknowledge her statement. "You will forge me armor from the materials provided here tonight." He said instead. "I expect it to be finished by morning, before your trial. The parts are absolutely not to be purified in any way, shape, or form, so that should cut some time out of the process."

Sango looked him over thoughtfully, and nodded. "Just don't let a human touch the material. The demonic aura will posses them. You should be fine, though. Your strong." She thought for a moment more, and then said, "And make sure you take it all off before your time of weakness."

The teacup froze on it's way to Entreri's lips, and Hendricks tensioned, glancing back and forth between the two. Entreri slowly lowered the teacup back to the table.

"This weakness." Entreri said. "It is general knowledge to people in this era?"

Sango glanced around nervously, afraid she had stepped into another no-no topic. "Not really." She said. "When I found out about InuYasha's transformation, I kept it secret for his sake. Sense then, I have only ever met half-demons and those they trust that know about it. It is a well kept secret."

"You know when InuYasha's time of vulnerability is?" Hendricks asked, trying not to sound too interested.

Sango observed him suspiciously. "And you don't?" She asked. "And your his..." She thought for a moment, glancing at Entreri. "Nephew. Your his nephew and you don't know this?"

Entreri, who had been observing Sango with slitted eyes, spoke. "We don't get along. He is still angered by a wrong I did him many years ago, and though he doesn't say it, I know my similarity to his most hated brother bothers him. Needless to say, we do not trust each other with such things."

"Is...is something wrong?" Sango asked, unnerved by the weight of the stares directed at her.

Hendricks glanced at Entreri. "Your Mother..." He warned.

"I know." The Hanyou said. "Sango, I would kill most people who knew about this weakness on pure principal. Demon, half-demon, or human. It matters not to me. Well I would not go out of my way in this era to eliminate such knowledge from the minds of others, if anyone but you presented an understanding of one of my greatest weaknesses so blatantly, and where any passing servant could overhear, they would already be dead."

Sango decided, then and there, that she would never again let herself forget that although he traveled with one of her oldest friends, this was _Sesshoumeru's_ son.

"However." Entreri continued, watching her reaction. "My Mother often spoke fondly of you, and the thought of killing her friend will...displease me."

Despite herself, she arched an eyebrow at that.

"So although it is bad business," He continued. "I will let you go unchallenged. I feel I must warn you, though, if you try to spread the knowledge that half-demons have a time when they lose their demonic heritage, I will not rip your spine out of your throat."

Sango blinked, opened her mouth, closed it.

"What?"

"You herd me." Entreri's face was just as impassive as if he had been talking about the weather. "I will not rip your spine out of you throat, and i will not then proceed to shred said spine into little tiny splinters and use said splinters to slowly and painfully remove your fingernails and then proceed to shove said fingernails into your eye sockets."

"Umm." She blinked. "You won't?"

"No." Entreri looked at her steadily. "Hendricks will."

Sango glanced at the bodyguard warily. He grinned at her, teeth looking a little too sharp for a human. She looked back at Entreri, sipping at his tea again, looking bored.

"And after Hendricks is done doing that, _then_ the torcher will begin." A hint of amusement in his cold, golden eyes. "Because then, and only then, will you be sent to me."

Sango desperately wished she had her Hiraikotsu with her. She looked angerly between the the smiling Hendricks and the statue Entreri, face darkening.

"You don't have to threaten me." She spat out. "You could have just asked me not to tell anyone. I wasn't going to, anyway. I've kept this secret for twenty three years."

"And yet," Entreri said. "You speak blatantly of it in front of Hendricks, who you did not know if he was told this secret, and in a house that you yourself has said was infiltrated by by your enimys to gain information from you."

Entreri shook his head. "You have been careless with this secret. It's a wonder the whole of Japan doesn't know."

Sango blushed, outraged and speechless. She was stronger than this! She was braver than this! She had forced herself to be stone and anger after the death of her brother and ex-lover! Where did that girl go? Why couldn't she tell him to fuck off? What was it about those cold passionless eyes that made her feel like a teenager again, awkward and afraid to look stupid in front of her enemies?

"You are dismissed now." Entreri said, waving his hand at her as if it was his tea parlor she was sitting in, and not her own. "Hendricks will escort you to fetch the dragon hide and give you my measurements, as well as the designs for the armor I will be requiring."

"But-but-!"

Hendricks glanced around and walked over to Entreri, pulling a curious object out of his jacket pocket. Sango blinked at it, trying to compare it anything she knew. A rifle? It was some what like that. It had a trigger, anyway, and the long, hallow tube. This one was smaller, though. And sleeker. A weapon from the future? From Kagome's era? She shuddered. She'd never quite been afraid of the future when Kagome brought stuff back for them, but this...

Hendricks held it out to his master, and Entreri glanced at it a moment before looking at Sango with something like amusement in his eyes. "I think you will need it more, old friend."

Hendricks did not smile. "Just watch your back." He grunted. Sango looked at the man before her, no-the Hanyou before her, and then shuddered when Hendricks left them there together alone, and she scrambled to get out after the detestable gunman, keeping her eyes on Entreri the whole way.

When she had left, Entreri slowly lifted his teacup to his lips to hide his smile.

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**Entreri was kind of mean in this one. You start to realize a little that maybe he's not exactly the good guy. This is reenforced later when you find out exactly what kind of 'organization' he runs.**

**And to comment on one of my comments, there actually is a small Kag/Sessh moment later in the story, when they meet again for the first time after Sesshoumeru finds out about Entreri.  
**

**Read and Review.  
**


	7. Funeral Arrangments

**Yes, I know. Entreri is turning out to be a bastard in more ways than one. I must warn you, you won't like him again for several more chapters. He is REALLY ditermined.**

**I will give you this, though. In a later chapter, you find out that Entreri inherited his father's phentant for sibling rivalry. I'll let you mull over the possabilitys that statement presents for a while.**

**Enjoy.**

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InuYasha was woken much too early by a servant who ignored his complaining and whining and bustled him out of the house, where his mood fouled even more at the sight of the still dark sky. Entreri and Hendricks were already saddled and ready to go.

Entreri wore dark cloths and a cloak that hid his face, and the rolled up carpet of dragon hide that had sat behind him on his horse the day before was gone, replaced by a package tied up nicely and ready to go.

"Why do we have to leave so bloody early?" InuYasha complained loudly.

Sango, walking up to them and leading InuYasha's horse, glared at him and held a finger to her lips. He then noticed the group of servants standing, watching silently from the doorway, all solemn and still. His two companions were silent as well, facing away from him and turning their ears to the dark and silent night.

InuYasha looked around for what could be causing the unease in the night, for even the birds and the crickets were quiet, waiting. A trickle of nervousness ran down his spine.

Sango walked up to him, and InuYasha noticed that all the horses had cloth wrapped around their hooves to keep their departure quiet.

His friend handed him the reins, and gave him a boost into the saddle, and then she stepped back and looked at him with an expression he didn't understand.

"Be swift." She said quietly. "Be silent. Flee." She glanced at InuYasha's two companions, and her eyes hardened. "And then never come back."

InuYasha whipped his head around to look at her, but her hand came down on the horse's flank, and with a whinny, his steed reared up and took off into the night, followed closely by the two other horses. Hendricks pulled ahead of the others and led the way, and InuYasha didn't have time to think, because as soon they were out of the castle walls and into the town itself, he was assaulted by the smell of smoke and a sense of urgency he could not place.

They rode through back alleys with the speed of the devil, and avoided main streets where hushed voices and flickering flames danced ominously. Once, some one spotted them passing and shouted, and they just barely managed to fly down the ally before an angry mob spilled into the street, seconds before they would have been cut off from escape.

"What is going on?" InuYasha shouted frantically, trying not to fall off his horse.

"It's almost sunrise." Entreri shouted. "They are going to storm the castle and capture Sango for her trial."

"What?" InuYasha reined in his horse. "We have to go back!"

They stopped and looked back at the difficult Hanyou impatiently. "Support from a half-demon will only hinder what little chance she has and lose her remaining supporters." Entreri stated coldly. "We've made it bad enough by staying the night, we're leaving now."

"No!" InuYasha turned his horse around. "I'm going back with or without you!" He was about to kick his horse into a run, when he herd the faint, muffled steps of one of the other horses. He started to turn, but then there was a great crash in his head and he slumped forward limply.

Hendricks put his gun back in it's holster, the butt of it still stained with the hanyou's blood, and grabbed InuYasha's reins with one hand and his own with the other. He kicked both horses into a run, InuYasha's prone form swaying with the movements and bouncing around in the saddle.

They rode hard and fast until well after sunrise, when Hendricks split from the group and left the still unconscious InuYasha with Entreri. It was only in the afternoon, when they had stopped to rest in the shade of an old oak tree, that InuYasha finally awoke, sitting up quickly and making his head swim.

He looked around, saw the two horses grazing in the grass, saw Entreri standing in the sunlight with his back to him, lacing up the guards on his forearm. He had donned what InuYasha assumed was the armor Sango made him out of Kibadoku's black hide, a strange garment that fit like a second skin on him and was overlaid with a chest and back plate, along with shoulder, shin, and knee guards all edged in green. He had on an obi with a light green and gold design on it.

InuYasha struggled to his feet past the stiff and cramped muscles of his back and legs, and staggered over to his nephew, looking rumpled and rubbing the back of his head.

"Fucking bastard." He seethed, glaring at Entreri. Entreri glanced at him, and then began over to the horses.

"Come." He said, ignoring InuYasha's looks. "We must be going if we are to meet Hendricks back in Edo."

"Why did you do that?" The hanyou growled.

"It was necessary." Entreri said. "We had not the time to waste, and I will not leave one of mine to be mauled by a crowd of angry ninjins."

"One of mine? Sango was one of mine!" InuYasha shouted. "Whatever you seem to think, I'm not part of your pack! I'm here for Kagome's sake and her's alone! I don't know why you think otherwise, but I _still hate you!_"

His last words still rang in the air, and InuYasha didn't seem to be on the verge of taking them back. Entreri stood, facing away from him with his back exposed. For a long moment, InuYasha's anger simmered.

"Then go to your friend," Entreri said. "And stay out of my way."

And with that, he pulled himself up on his horse and rode off, never once looking back.

* * *

Hendricks arrived at Totosai's soon after he left his boss and InuYasha behind, once again riding through the smoke and ash rising through the ground. The demon carcass the old smith resided in was right as it had been, gaping jaws ready to swallow him whole.

Totosai himself was sitting on the edge of his forge, still hot and belching smoke from it's recent activity's. He was sitting with his great silver hammer slung over one shoulder and a long katana in one hand, using the other to sharpen it. He looked up as Hendricks entered.

"So your back, eh? Just in time, too." He jumped up and held the sword out to Hendricks invitingly. "Go on. Take it. Did you know that the soul in the merrier was a nihility demon? No demonic aura at all! Human's shouldn't have a problem with it, even with the aura in the bones you gave me. By becoming one, both the bones in the mirror have no aura."

Hendricks looked at the offered sword warily, before taking it in one hand. I really was a well crafted weapon, even his untrained eyes could see that. Though how Entreri's bones had been forged into steel, he would never know.

It was roughly three feet long, with green and gold trimming on the handle. (at this, he briefly wondered if the old demon smith was psychic, or just lucky to get the same colors that edged Entreri's armor) The metal gleamed unnaturally sharp, but other than that, there was only one thing that marked the sword as unusual. In the place where a blood grove would normally be, running along the length of the blade, was instead a long reflective stripe, brighter than the metal around it.

The mirror, once broken and shattered, had been melted down and forged into the first sword of Entreri, son of the Great Lord Sesshoumeru. Hendricks held it up approvingly to the light, expecting to see his own sunglasses looking back at him.

Blank, soulless black eyes stared out at him, framed by white hair. He dropped the sword in sheer surprise. Totosai glowered at him.

"Give me that!" He said, grabbing the sword off the ground. "Idiot. Didn't I tell you there was a soul trapped in there? Don't look so surprised."

Hendricks drew himself up. "Yes, well." He cleared his throat. "Will she be a problem?"

"Not at all. She's pretty passive." Totosai shrugged. "She likes to show you things, though. People, places. I don't think some of them are real, though. Just dreams, visions, metaphors."

"Ah." Hendricks said, like he understood. "Well then, did you finish my special order? I purchased some demon fangs here that have been purified at the slayers town for the next batch." He tossed a sack onto a nearby ledge, the objects inside clicking together.

"Yes." Totosai's mood dropped. "I can have those new ones ready in a week. Unfortunately, the ones I currently have, have not lost their demonic aura, so I suggest you use them before they posses you or attract other demons."

"Right." Hendricks said nervously. Totosai walked over to one wall and picked up a pair of tongs, then walked over to one of the ledges at the edge of the room and carefully picked up a single bullet, holding it away from him.

"Hold out your hand." Hendricks did so reluctantly, eying the little glittering object warily. It dropped into his palm, and he almost flinched at the contact, but managed to resist. It glittered there innocently, only slightly lighter in shade than other bullets he had used. It was surprisingly modern looking, matching exactly the bullet he had given the smith for reference.

He waited a moment, then shrugged. "It seems alright to me."

"Yes, well." Totosai said, eying him. "Don't be fooled by your senses, you stupid ninjin. Your absolutely covered in demonic aura."

Hendricks shrugged. "I've killed demons before. I'll live."

Totosai looked skeptical. "It's your funeral."

He nodded. "And the others?"

The old smith made two more trips with the tongs, picking up the bullets one at a time. Hendricks was left with three little death balls in his palm that he promptly put in his gun, taking out three of his own bullets to make room.

"You know how I said I want to see what those can do?" Totosai asked. "I've changed my mind. Now, I want you to take them as far away as possible."

Hendricks smirked and tucked his gun back in it's holder inside his jacket. "Whatever you say, old man. Just don't forget about our little wager."

"Yah, yah. Just get out." He made a 'go away' gesture with his hand and turned back to his forge. Hendricks shrugged, took the sword, and turned away, only to be stopped by a call from Totosai.

"Oh, and rifle boy?"

He looked back over his shoulder. "Yes?"

"Her name is Kanna."

He blinked. "What?"

"The sword." Totosai said. "Her name is Kanna."

"Kanna." Hendricks tested it on his tong. He nodded. "Yes, it will do." He held the sword up again, observing it.

"Kanna, prepare to meet your new master."

* * *

Hendricks rode up to their camp next to the Bone Eater's Well and swung himself down from his horse. He pulled a cloth wrapped package from the back of the saddle and carried it into the tent that was set up. Entreri was inside, in full lotus position, eyes closed. His new armor gleamed darkly.

"Very Zen, Master Yoda. The force is strong in you." Hendricks commented dryly.

Entreri cracked an eye at him. "You are absolutely covered in demonic aura."

Hendricks shrugged. "Demonic bullets. An experiment."

Entreri's other eye was open now, looking at him with cold, golden orbs. "Let me correct my previous statement. You are absolutely covered in _my _demonic aura."

"Hey, that armor looks great on you." Hendricks not-so-subtly changed the topic. "I like it. Very feudal. Very war lord-ish."

"When in Rome." Entreri said dryly. "Your just lucky my aura is familiar with you, or it would have shredded your brains by now."

Hendricks sobered. "Don't even joke about that."

"I'm not."

Hendricks shrugged off the rather morbid conversation and stepped forward, placing the cloth wrapped bundle on the kotatsu before Entreri, who frowned.

"Is this it? I can't sense my bones or aura at all. I think Totosai might have cheated us."

"No, no." Hendricks shook his head. "He said the soul trapped in the mirror was a-a-_nihility_ demon. That it had no aura."

Entreri's eyebrows went up. "Interesting. So many surprises." He began to unwrap the cloth from around the sword, and when it was freed, he held it up before his face.

"Good craftsmanship." He murmured, examining the blade. "Nice balance. Could have done better melting the mercury in the mirror onto the blade, but he is only a sword smith. I can't blame him for that." Hendricks saw Entreri's eyebrows go up as he looked into the thin, reflective stripe that ran along the blade. "And would you look at that. There she is."

Hendricks looked at the sword suspiciously. "I don't like it. Weapons shouldn't have people inside them."

"Human weapons shouldn't have people inside them." Entreri corrected. "Demon weapons should."

"Whatever." Hendricks grumbled. "Totosai said it's name was Kanna."

"Kanna?" Entreri asked. "I guess it makes sense."

"Where did InuYasha go?"

"He left after he awoke to go back to the slayer." Entreri said emotionlessly. "I don't expect him back."

There was a beat of silence.

"You know we can save them both." Hendricks said evenly.

"I am aware."

Hendricks waited, but when he received no more answer than that, his face went blank and he nodded to himself. "I will attend to the funeral arrangements then. Do you wish your mother to be informed?"

"No." Entreri said. "In fact, hold off the arrangements until we know for a fact he is dead. Demons, even half-demons, are quite resilient, even with a crippling injury such as my Uncle's."

"Very well then." Hendricks said. "We move on to phase two then?"

Entreri gave a sharp nod, and Hendricks grinned. He moved to the wall of the tent piled high with boxes and dug through them until he found what he was looking for, a large crate twice as long as a man's arm. He pried it open and removed the long-range rifle within with a flourish.

"This is going to be sweet."

* * *

**Hehehe. Next chapter: THE MEETING.**

**Dun dun DUNNN!**

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	8. An Offer

**It's been forever, I know. I have a good excuse, you're sure. You're sure there's a perfectly good reason I haven't updated in months. You're sure I'll explain it now, and everything will be wonderful again.**

**You'd be wrong. There is no good reason, I just stopped, and this might be the only chapter for another six months and there's nothing you can do about it.  
**

**So ha.  
**

**And Enjoy.  
**

**Yes. Capital E.**

* * *

"Rin."

Rin looked up at her name and ran forward to catch up with the Taiyoukai. He stood a little ways up the path, his back to her and his face turned away.

"Yes, Lord Sesshoumeru?" She asked cheerfully and she came to a stop just behind him.

Sesshoumeru glanced at her, then turned his attention back to the road in front of them. "Take Ah-Un and fly away."

Rin gave an over enthusiastic bow and popped back up with a happy, "Yes, my Lord!", and ran back to the dragon. Jaken glanced at his Lord, then began edging little steps to the waiting dragon. Sesshoumeru turned his head and settled cold, golden eyes on the little imp.

"Jaken."

The toad daemon's eyes bulged out and he gave a little jump. "Yes, mi Lord?" He stammered out.

"You will accompany me."

Jaken jumped to obey, rushing forward on stubby little legs. "Yes! Mi Lord!" He cried. The Taiyoukai began walking, his loyal retainer struggling to keep up. The staff of Two Heads bobbed along in time to the imp's steps, towering to almost twice the height of the little demon, but still falling far short of Sesshoumeru's towering stature. Sunlight streamed through breaks in the summer trees overhanging the path, dappling the odd pair in shadow and light. A soft breeze teased Sesshoumeru's knee length, silver hair in waves.

Jaken looked up through a break in the overhang as the belly of Ah-Un flew overhead in a rush of wind. Rin's feet could just barley be seen on ether side of the dragon's flanks as she held on tightly to the brittle.

"Uh...Lord Sesshoumeru?" Jaken inquired nervously.

He received no answer, and he hadn't really expected one.

"Lord Sesshoumeru?" He began again. "May I inquire as to what we are doing, mi Lord?"

"Something lies ahead." Sesshoumeru said, as if that explained it all.

"Ahh." Jaken said wisely. There was a moment of silence. "Mi Lord?" The toad said. "Could we not just go around it?"

"We have already gone around it. It put it's self in our path once more."

Sharp eyes pierced straight ahead, as if they could see straight through the shadows and darkness of the forest. Jaken suddenly felt as if the day was not quite as sunny and warm as it had started out.

Jaken suddenly shook his head at his own foolishness. Sesshoumeru Sema would obliterate any threat to them, and then they would continue on as usual.

After a while the trees gave way over head and they found themselves in a grassy field surrounded by forest. Sesshoumeru continued on until they reached the very center of the open space, glancing neither left nor right. Sunlight glinted off silver hair caught in a breeze. Jaken stopped with his master, and after a moment began to look around and fidget a little.

The little toad glanced around at the surrounding forest nervously. "Mi Lord, is there-" Jaken began, only to be silenced by a cold glare from Sesshoumeru. Jaken cowered, undecided as to weather he should be cowering from their mysterious pursuer or his own Lord.

The silence continued, unbroken, until Sesshoumeru's head snapped in one direction and his whip snapped out into the shadows of the forest. Jaken clearly heard the snap as it made contact with something, but then, surprisingly the green rope pulled taunt and stuck, as if caught on something.

Sesshoumeru's eyes narrowed.

* * *

Hendricks lined up the shot perfectly from the cliff he watched from, sighting his unsuspecting target in his cross hairs. A reasonably sized, two headed dragon twisted up, up into the air, before leveling out and flying steady in his scope. He made sure to catch sight of a head of dark hair streaming out in the wind behind the beast before his finger rested on the trigger.

It was a gun resembling an anti-tank rifle in appearance, the kind that's so big you have to prop it on the ground to use it. But they were fighting demons, and when a human faces a demon, you can never really be too careful. The thing was sleek, deadly, and absolutely mammoth.

Hendricks zoomed in with his scope and sighted a dark brown eye.

He pulled the trigger.

* * *

"An admirable effort, but not, I think, for me" The poison whip gave a tug at the words, and Sesshoumeru was actually dragged forward a step, before he wrapped his fist around around his end and pulled back, snapping the whip taunt under the pressure of two opposing forces.

His golden eyes were like ice.

"This Sesshoumeru will give only one warning." He articulated coldly. "Leave."

A dark chuckle, without any mirth. "Lord Sesshoumeru, through some misplaced sense of respect, or perhaps fair play, I have decided to make a request of you instead of attempting to force from you what I want."

Jaken would have laughed, had he not felt so oppressed by Sesshoumeru's youki, which stirred to life suddenly around him. The Taiyouki gave a sharp tug on his whip, and it was the mysterious, unseen man in the forest that gave an inch of ground this time.

"This Sesshoumeru does not deal with trash."

"I am trying to be civil here, for practicality, if nothing else." There was no responding flare of youki, no sudden noticeable increase of power, but the shadow in the shadows tugged back on the whip again, and despite the obviously powerful youki surrounding his Lord Sesshoumeru, Jaken watched with some measure of shock as the Taiyouki was once again forced to take a step forward.

"But you are trying my patience." The man-demon?-continued. "The sword, Tensaiga, you carry, is something I need. I know for a fact you can only use it on a person once, so it will not be useful to you in regards to the girl, and I suspect the imp has also been raised at one point or another. You have no use for a sword that cannot cut and cannot bring your loved ones back from the dead."

Sesshoumeru's golden orbs stared with expressionless fury into the dark.

"Allow me to buy it from you, or trade for it. Let us be civil. I have done nothing to you, you were the one who threw the first strike." The voice was persuasive, charming even.

"I will not repeat myself. I not deal with trash."

"Alright then, I can see where you are coming from." The voice responded, deep and smooth. "I'll give you a little time to think about it, because believe it or not, I have no wish to see you dead. However, I cannot leave this place until I posses that blade. In three days, I will return and make you an offer that will cost you to refuse."

The green whip gave one last tug from the stranger's end, and the force finally dissolved the glowing stand from Sesshoumeru's fist, disappearing with a poisonous hiss. Jaken gasped.

The demon Lord growled and rushed twords the tree line, claws extended and fangs bared, only to be stopped in his tracks by a distant scream and a loud roar of pain. A crash could be herd, cutting the sound off abruptly. His eyes flashed behind him, then back to the trees, and back to the direction the sound had come from.

"Three days, Lord Sesshoumeru." The voice faded into the night. "Three days."

The Taiyouki growled viciously, and spun around to stalk back to the forest now darkening in twilight.

"Wait for me, Lord Sesshoumeru!" Jaken cried, waddling after him.

* * *

Entreri gave one final tug of his wrist, which had caught his father's acid whip when it had flashed out with unnerving accuracy at him. The strand broke and dissolved into steam, and he faded away into the forest with his last parting words.

"Three days, Lord Sesshoumeru. Three days."

Now, he had to be fast to get to the girl first, but he was positive he could get there before the Taiyouki.

Sesshoumeru was running.

But Entreri was flying.

. . . .

There was cold and darkness. She had no form. No shape. And yet she did, in a sense. She was aware of being carried, the arms around her the only warmth in this cold place. Wisps of darkness, darker than the shadows that consumed her now, wavered around her in an untouchable breeze, and then leveled out to a cool waving motion as the shadows faded and sunlight reasserted itself.

_Hair. _She thought numbly. _It was black hair, not shadows._

She turned in the arms holding her aloft, and met the amber gold gaze of the man from earlier. Long, perfectly straight, black hair framed his aristocratic face, and he wore a strange kind of scale-hide armor.

Then he dropped her.

"What-?" She stammered, staring up at him.

His eyes glittered coldly at her.

"You…" She blinked, gasped. "Oh, no! What happened to Ah-Uhn?"

He raised an eyebrow..

"The dragon!" Rin cried, looking up at him. He stepped back as she struggled to her feet and looked around frantically. She was with a strange man after what she was sure had been an attack of some sort, in a place she didn't recognize, and-

She blinked. Looked around. "This is Edo!" Rin exclaimed. "I used to live here with a miko named-"

"Kaede."

Rin blinked at him. "You know her?"

The man smiled. It didn't look natural. "You could say she's...a friend of the family. She's dead now."

"Oh. Yah. I know. I was at her funeral." Rin continued to look at him. "You know, you sort of look like-"

"Lord Sesshoumeru?" He finished.

She nodded. The dark haired man nodded. "I am his son."

Her eyes widened. "I didn't know Lord Sesshoumeru had a-!"

"I know." The man-demon?-cut her off again. "It's been a while sense I was in these parts."

"Oh. Well I'm Rin! Nice to meet ya!" She stuck out her hand enthusiastically, a smile on her face. The man blinked at her slowly.

Her smile started to waver, and she withdrew it uncertainty.

"I-" Rin began, stopped. She cleared her throat and looked at the ground.

"Come." The man turned and began walking to the treeline.

Rin thought. She thought about the relationship Shesshoumeru had with his father, that she had managed to piece together over the years. She thought about the sheer ungodly amount of family feuds she'd seen between demons in the past.

But mostly, she thought about all the times she'd been kidnapped to get to her Lord Sesshoumeru.

Rin sighed. She had a feeling she knew what had happened. She set off at a reluctant shuffle after the dark haired demon, arms wrapped around herself.

It was quiet for a long time, and then-

"Entreri."

She looked up and blinked. "What?"

"My name." He said, tonelessly. "-is Entreri."

* * *

**If you don't mind that there is only a little bit of s/k in the story, I should tell you that while the is more e/r than s/k, that's still really not much at all.**

The thing wasn't even sapost to be a romance, it was really sapost to focus around Entreri and his father, and if that was an option on the character list, I would have put it.

And like I said, Entreri/Sesshoumeru family/drama fic. Like, maybe there will be a couple paragraphs of Rin every other chapter, and then one sorta big chapter twords the end, but really I put that in there to screw with Sesshoumeru a little. Add a new dynamic to his relationship with Entreri. I never really liked Rin in fanfiction, to tell you the truth. She's good in the anime, though.

Besides, can't you just picture it when Sesshoumeru finds out?

**Read and Review.  
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